LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas researcher who led a study on social media says giving it up doesn’t make a person significantly happier and concerns about social media may be overblown.
Communications professor Jeffrey Hall has told The Topeka Capital-Journal that he was surprised by the finding.
Some participants abstained from social media from one to four weeks while a control group continued normal use and reported an average of 72 minutes a day. The study followed 135 people, with most from Kansas.
Hall said there doesn’t seem to be a lot of evidence that social media replaces face-to-face interactions. He said people who spent less time perusing social media spent more time on the internet, working, taking care of their children, cooking and cleaning.
